


Thanks for the Memories

by BrownieFox



Category: Paranatural (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen, Time Travel, also lucifer gets swapped around, bsing my way through this
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-11
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-08 04:09:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17379278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrownieFox/pseuds/BrownieFox
Summary: Getting swapped around with his future self wasn't how Rick thought he'd be spending his week, but here he is with four other spectrals and no choice but to wait around.Meanwhile Spender enjoys a little vacation time and catches up with some old-but-younger friends





	1. Chapter 1

“Aw shoot!”

Rick stared down at the first floor of the library where his glasses were lying, next to the book he’d dropped. He swore he could feel Lucifer glaring at him from the tool. The spirit kept telling him not to spend so much time in the Heightened Perception State, but there was so much more research Rick could do during it.

Unfortunately, Rick had forgotten that there was really a railing right there that the HPS had decided looked a lot better as a flowing curtain that Rick had thought was just a doorway, running into it, and knocking the sunglasses off of his face.

“Shhhh!” One of the other academy students was glaring at him from their work table. Rick resisted the urge to look at them, instead muttering a sorry and trying to hide his face as he made a B line for the stairs.

He swore he could feel the Shadow wriggling around inside of him. Moments. Seconds. Lucifer had drilled those words into him. All the time he’d have to get his glasses back if their bond was broken, if the distance between them was too great to maintain a connection. And there were few worse places to release a dark shadow monster than in a school full of kids in the middle of the day.

Rick nearly fell down the spiral staircase in his rush, feeling his ankle twist a bit uncomfortably but opting to ignore it for now. There, just a few feet away, was Lucifer’s tool. Rick reached out with his spectral energy, desperately trying to reach the sunglasses-

-just as the floor disappeared from beneath his feet.

The fear that had been drowned in adrenaline stabbed through Rick as he fell into an endless whirlpool of dark purple energy. Was this it? A few feet away from his sunglasses, and the Shadow breaks out and destroys all of Mayview, maybe even the whole world.

The young spectral screamed, but his voice was lost in the void as he plummeted down, down, down. Something flew past him, the figure falling upwards, but Rick was too buzy hyperventalating to see what it was. Probably something that the Shadow had attacked. The medium curled up on himself, a tight ball as a few tears slipped past his squeezed-shut eyes. He’d failed Mayview.

Sound returned, sharp and almost painful, and Rick gasped as he hit something hard and solid, eyes reflexively opening back up. Everything was bright, but Rick could care less. There, just within arms length, was a pair of sunglasses that he immediately recognized as Lucifer’s. Without a second thought, no hesitation, he slapped his arm out and grabbed the tool, cramming it onto his face.

Everything was dark, pure darkness, for a moment as he entered HPS. The darkness was quickly banished, back to the edges of the domain, as Lucifer shouted. Rick sighed with relief, slowly climbing back to his feet.

“S-sorry, Lucifer, I’ll, I’ll be more careful,” Rick wiped away the tears, shaking slightly and wincing as he put pressure on his right foot. Right, he’d hurt it coming down the stairs. The spirit looked down at him, single eye squinted, and then stooped down to look him in the eyes, something he rarely did.

“... it would SEEM WE HAVE much more to WORRY ABOUT THAN dropped classes, RICHARD.” Rick’s brow scrunched up in confusion as the HPS melted away back into broad daylight.

“HYAA!”

Rick spun around just in time to see a kid, green spectral energy flowing off of him, slice through the side of a huge grudge. Another kid, this one with red energy, formed her energy into giant clawed hands that she raked down the top of the grudge. There were blurs of blue and black from the other side of the beast, but Rick couldn’t see the people they belonged to.

The red-energy girl caught sight of him and jumped off of the grudges back, landing in front of him.

“M… Mr. Spender?”

oOo

The tail of the grudge caught Spender by surprise, hitting him straight in the stomach and knocking him away. He squeezed his eyes shut as he fell to the ground, hitting the asphalt hard and scraping up his arms. When he opened his eyes, the world was much brighter and in vivid colors, glasses lying just within arms reach.

He reached to grab it just as the grudge roared, voice booming and echoing across the street. With each roar, it had conjured up what looked like dark holes in space that they’d all been careful to ignore.

Which would be just Spender’s luck for this one to appear right beneath him.

There wasn’t even time to scream as he was pulled into the all encompassing darkness, away from the kids and, perhaps most importantly, away from Lucifer and his tool. His energy flared around him, a mass of yellow that seemed to be the only thing that existed as he continued to plummet downwards. His arms were wrapped around his stomach, waiting for the Shadow open up his stomach and for its shadow tendrils to leap out.

Something flew past him, rising at the same speed he was falling. It looked like a young child, curled up into a ball. Spender tried to reach for them to say something, but no words left his mouth and the distance between them grew too great too fast.

Then, like a switch had been flipped, Spender wasn’t falling anymore. Or rather, he was falling in the other direction, and only a distance of an inch at most as he landed with a soft thud on a carpet. Spender took no other notice of his surroun words into him. All the time he’d have to get his glasses back if their bond was broken, if dings as he saw it, just a few feet from him. He’d recognize Lucifer’s tool anywhere.

Spender reached it with his energy, establishing the connection with the tool and immediately being pulled into the Heightened Perception, the entire room cast into deep shadows. Spender ignored them, trusting Lucifer to subdue the Shadow and opting to close the distance between him and the took, picking the glasses up and putting them back into their familiar position on his space.

There was a shout behind him and a flare of light, driving the darkness away, and Spender sighed in relief, a hand resting on his stomach again. It was okay. Mayview wouldn’t be destroyed.

“... you aRE RICHard.”

The familiar deep voice reached Spender’s ears, but his brow furrowed in confusion as he turned around to face the spirit.

“Yes?”

Lucifer floated closer, staring Spender down before shaking his head.

“IT WOULD Seem we are iN QUITE A PREDIcament.” Lucifer hummed. The HPS faded away, leaving Spender standing in a library he hadn’t seen in eight years.


	2. Chapter 2

Rick stared at the girl, trying to figure out how to respond to that.

“I mean… I usually go by Rick? ‘Cause I’m not fifty? How do you know my name? Did Boss Leader send you?” She, in turn, blinked. She turned back to look at the grudge the other three were fighting, swinging the umbrella in her hand in large circles. 

“Hey guys, make sure it tools!” She shouted back at them before returning her attention to Rick, looking cautious and uncertain. “You don’t know my name, do you.”

“No?” Was there some memo he’d missed out on? Rick took a moment to take in his surroundings. He easily recognized the familiar houses, the lake in the distance, the hill that the academy rested atop. This was definitely Mayview, so at the very least whatever that black pit had done - whether it was the Shadow or some other spirit - it had left him still in his hometown. 

“Well, I’m Isabel Guerra.” She held out her hand, but Rick didn’t take it, gears in his mind whirring away as he tried to process that.

“Isabel Guerra?” He repeated, making sure he hadn’t heard wrong. Her hand dropped a bit and she nodded slowly.

“Yes?”

“You wouldn’t happen to be related to Francisco, Anita, and Samuel Guerra, would you?” Maybe she was just a niece of Anita and Sam that had come into town? Isabel nodded, brightening a bit at what must’ve been familiar names. 

“Yeah, Francisco is my grandpa.” 

“That’s not-” Rick started to say, but was cut off as the tail of the grudge slapped down between them. They both jumped back, the red spectral energy - just like Samuel’s - flowing off of her and condensing on the tip of her finger as she fired a spectral shot. 

Whatever was going on here could wait. Rick was first and foremost a protector of his town. 

The green spectral managed to cut off one of the grudge’s legs while Isabel ran under it. Rick wasn’t able to see what she did, but it flipped the grudge onto its back. It wriggled around, its five remaining legs lashing out. The two spectrals Rick hadn’t seen were now in view, the blue one hopping around, a long and thin blue spectral construct following him as he wove around the legs, tying them together. The black spectral was hitting the grudge’s skull with his bat, nimbly avoiding its teeth. 

Rick gathered his spectral energy to his hands, hesitant to use Lucifer’s powers so shortly after cutting through the Shadow. He sharpened the energy into clawed hands, grinning at them before rushing to join the battle and raking them down the side of the grudge. It looked like it was already pretty exhausted. 

The grudge let out a great, bellowing roar that seemed to vibrate in Rick’s bones. 

“Watch out!” 

The green spectral let out a tendril of energy like a whip to Isabel, wrapping it around her wrist. She grabbed onto it and let herself be pulled out of the way just as a dark vortex opened up beneath her. It closed shortly after it formed, but the glimpse was all Rick needed. He hadn’t gotten a good look at what he’d fallen into, but it seemed safe to assume that it hadn’t been the Shadow like he had thought, but rather something this grudge had created. 

His moment of hesitation got him smacked in the face by the creature’s tongue.

Right, he was in the middle of a fight.

Rick’s nose wrinkled in disgust as the vaguely-green slobber coated the side of his face. He grabbed the tongue before it could dart away and used his other hand to cut off, which was immediately followed by pained howling from the grudge. The beast wriggled around, managing to flip back onto its stomach, but it’s legs were still bound tightly by the blue spectral energy wrapped around them. Rick readied a spectral shot, but before he had the chance to fire it, Isabel cut through its neck with a bladed octopus tentacle construct.

The grudge gave one final, weak attempt at a roar before the giving up its form, becoming a small and white vapor-like wisp in the air. The green spectral shoved a water bottle at the spirit, and the weak spirit immediately took the chance to possess the object. 

“Alright, great work team!” The green spectral whooped, high fiving the blue and black ones while Isabel immediately came back over to him. 

“Spender!” 

“Rick.” He repeated, taking a cautionary step back. “Who are you really? Lil’ Izzy is only a few months old, so maybe steal the name of somebody a bit closer to your age next time.” 

She held up her hands placatingly while the other three approached curiously. He eyed them over. He’d just seen all four of them in action, and he wasn’t sure he’d be capable of fighting off all of them at once if it came down to it. 

“What’s going on? Did the spirit shrink Spender or something?” The green spectral asked. Rick wasn’t able to see his eyes but assumed that the spectral was looking him over. The blue one looked more cautious, a palm pointed towards Spender but not with enough energy around it to form anything, while the black one just looked mildly curious. 

“No, I think it made him younger.” 

“Younger?!” Rick echoed, “What-, but-, I’ve never heard of a spirit that could do that!” 

“Neither have I, but here you are so I guess it’s possible.” Isabel shrugged. “C’mon, let’s get to the Dojo, I’m sure my grandpa will be able to help sort this out.”

oOo

“14. Wow. So we haven’t known each other very long, have we.” 

Spender walked casually down the halls of his old school, smiling slightly at the familiarity of it all. Of course, it wouldn’t be Mayview Academy like he remembered it without the dark and drastic shadows, the heavy and thick cloths over everything, and Lucifer gliding across the floor next to him.

“No. We’re coming up on about a year now, I believe.” The spirit hummed. Spender looked upward at the Shadow. It looked so much weaker, features harder to see, tendrils not nearly as long or as many in number. The Shadow’s growth had been so gradual over the years that Spender hadn’t realized just how big it had gotten until now, looking up at how weak it was. 

“Is he still researching lake-related spirits?” Spender asked, passing by a teacher stopped mid-step. Mr. Avery. Spender had never been too fond of him. 

“Yes. Young Richard seems to firmly believe that, despite what I’ve told him, it’ll be found in some book just lying on the shelf.” Lucifer shook his head. Spender shrugged.

“At least it kept me out of trouble for the most part. Except for when it lead to my trouble.” 

“Please tell me I don’t have to pull you out of the lake again.” Lucifer sniffed and Spender chuckled.

“C’mon, you think little nearly-drowned Rick is going anywhere near the lake?” Lucifer didn’t have an answer to that. In Spender’s time, it would be because Lucifer knew that Spender ran on emotions and threw caution to the wind. Right now, with this Lucifer, it felt more like Lucifer was just genuinely unsure what Rick was like. 

Spender stepped into the early afternoon light, out of the academy, and out of the HPS now that he wasn’t a weird adult man nobody knew in a building full of little kids. His parents would be worried when he didn’t come home from school today, but they didn’t know about spectrals. There was no way they were going to believe he was their son from the future. There was, however, somebody who would be more accepting of such events. 

It was a few miles from the Academy to the Dojo. Spender let himself take in the vaguely familiar town as he walked. Trees were smaller, whole neighborhoods didn’t exist yet, one of the bridges across the rivers was broken but almost done being repaired. Spender winced when he saw that last part. Fighting with spirits, luckily, didn’t typically lead to collateral damage, but whatever had happened that day had left a bit of a toll on the physical world. 

At least some things didn’t change. 

The Dojo was the same as ever. Spectral energy from its inhabitants poured out of every open door and window. The grass was still tall, good for practice sneaking around and a great excuse for never mowing. There were two agents sparring away at each other and Spender gave them a wide berth. They paused for maybe a moment as they looked at him, not recognizing him, but didn’t seem like they could be bothered to properly cared as they resumed not three seconds later. The front steps were always creaking, and walking up them felt like coming home. He’d spent so much of his childhood, his teen years, his adult years at this place. Honing his skills, researching form the Guerra’s wide selection of texts, looking longingly at the other yellow-energy tools with cool abilities he’d never be able to use. 

He had to resist the urge to just enter the building without knocking, like he had always done, and instead knocked on the front door. There was a myriad of voices on the other side, and for a moment he thought that perhaps he hadn’t been heard over them. When he raised his hand to knock again, the door swung open to reveal someone he hadn’t seen in a while. 

Sam Guerra regarded him cautiously. Spender offered a small wave as greeting while Sam looked him over. At first he looked almost bored with Spender, probably figuring he was just some random Consortium agent. His eyes glanced over Spender’s and then fixed themselves there, squinting slightly. Less to see Spender’s eyes, he was sure, and more getting a look at the sunglasses that hid them from view. 

From Spender’s memory of the man, Sam wasn’t a violent man. But the longer they stared at each other, the longer Sam stared at Spender’s tool, the more spectral energy came off of him, coagulating around the hand not holding the door open.

“Where did you find that tool?” Sam asked a bit stiffly and Lucifer put his hands up in surrender. 

“Listen, Mr. Guerra, this is going to sound crazy I know but it’s me, Rick.” Spender cursed himself for not having some kind of birthmark or scar that dated this far back that he could show off to the other Spectral. 

“Rick is fourteen.” Sam responded, but the tension in his frame loosened a bit. 

“It was a spirit with a weird power. My theory so far is that it swapped me and the younger me.” Spender took a hesitant step back towards the door. The last thing he wanted to do was take a spectral blast from a pacifist. He dropped his voice as he continued. “I could prove it’s me, but I doubt you’d want the Shadow back out in the open.” 

Sam was quiet for second before stepping back and letting Spender into the house.

“... how old are you, Rick?” Spender scratched the back of his head.

“Twenty-six. I teach at Mayview Middle right now.” Spender smiled and Sam whistled.

“That’s almost as old as  _ me. _ C’mon, let’s find somewhere to sit while I get Anita and Francisco. Hopefully they’ll be able to help. I’ve never heard of something like this happening, but I don’t doubt it’s possible.” Sam mused, winding up the house until they reached the his own room. He opened the door and strode right in and Spender followed behind him. “Wait here while I get the others.”

Spender looked around the room. He’d never been in here before, at least not when the Guerra’s had lived in it. Like most rooms at the Dojo, it was on the smaller side, though under normal circumstances there would’ve been a couple other students shoved in. The couple probably only got their own room because it was home to both Francisco’s son and his granddaughter. 

On that thought, Spender walked over to the crib by the wall, peeking into it. Isabel was lying on her back, fast asleep, little cheeks pudgy and perfectly squishable. Looking at her, a small string of homesickness managed to worm his way into his heart.

He hoped his own Isabel and the rest of the club had defeated the grudge without getting hurt. He hoped the younger Rick was okay. Perhaps most importantly, he hoped he wouldn’t have to wait another thirteen years before he got to see the older Isabel again.

**Author's Note:**

> can we just say Isaac named the title? easier than saying I couldn't come up with anything :P  
> this will probably update as i write the chapters. Just saying, more review and people interested will make me work more on it ;)


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